POP MUSIC REVIEW : Nylons Still Pleasing With Rich Harmonies

You can’t help but love the Nylons, even when they don’t exactly make it easy to do so. Their program at the Greek Theatre on Wednesday night was a case in point--a mixed bag of the pluses and minuses of this gifted a cappella group.

At their best, they’ve taken doo-wop singing to a higher level, with startingly rich harmonies, strong lead singing and foot-tapping rhythms. On songs like their signature “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” “Me and the Boys,” “Silhouettes” and “Life of the Party,” the Nylons were super-fine, nearly as good as a cappella gets.

Amazingly, they were even better on the numbers in which Marc Connors exercised his high falsetto--notably on the original “Face in the Crowd,” and the Carole King/Gerry Goffin classic, “Up on the Roof.”

The group’s minuses surfaced during bass Arnold Robinson’s reading of Sam Cooke’s “Chain Gang”--a stunning performance that was marred by the tasteless chain gang mimicry of the other group members.

Equally problematic was the Nylons’ use of taped drum tracks for at least half of their songs. There’s no doubt that the additional rhythmic textures helped provide contrast for what might otherwise have been a long two hours of pure vocalizing.

But taping, even when the drums are hot and the singing energetic, locks performers into a fixed framework that inevitably restricts their creativity. The Nylons are too good to limit themselves in this fashion.

They’re also too good to indulge in the vapid jokes and Vegas dance steps that cropped up with growing frequency as the show continued. Some groups desperately need the benefits of commercial packaging and presentation. The Nylons don’t, and they’d be a lot more lovable if they had greater confidence in their unquestioned musical skills.